Defence Minister Rajnath Singh is chairing a Group of Ministers (GoM) assembly in Delhi this night to debate the financial state of affairs and implementation of the Rs 20 lakh crore fiscal aid bundle introduced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the coronavirus-hit Indian economic system.

Hours earlier than the assembly began Ms Sitharaman instructed information company ANI that the federal government had put nice thought into the aid measures introduced for various sectors of the economic system, and that these are on par with these introduced by different nations, together with developed nations.

“Before doing this, we compared every announcement made by different countries to see what their packages consisted of. Every country has brought in a basket of measures – fiscal, monetary, guarantees, central liquidity and so on,” the Finance Minister stated.

“We are not all that different… proportions might vary. When developed countries have certain institutions, it is possible for them to go through one route and play less on the other. India has great advantage in terms of technology, transfer of cash… That is how, through PM Garib Kalyan, we could infuse cash into hands of people,” she added.

Ms Sitharaman additionally identified that different nations had been additionally making an attempt to infuse liquidity via central financial institution measures – one thing the Reserve Financial institution of India (RBI) introduced Friday, whereas warning that India’s GDP may contract additional this monetary yr and “is estimated to remain in negative territory” within the subsequent.

The Rs 20 lakh crore bundle, described by the Prime Minister as being price 10 per cent of the GDP and particulars of which had been launched by Ms Sitharaman over 5 tranches of bulletins this week, has been criticised by the opposition. Congress chief P Chidambaram has been amongst its most vocal critics, arguing it “has left several sections high and dry”.

“… a fiscal stimulus of Rs 1,86,650 crore amounting to barely 0.91 per cent of GDP will be totally inadequate given the gravity of the economic crisis and the dire situation in which people find themselves,” the previous Finance Minister stated in an announcement launched this week.

The GoM headed by Mr Singh has met on a number of events thus far, with one assembly earlier this month reviewing suggestions on the phased lifting of lockdown restrictions. This was earlier than the federal government prolonged the coronavirus lockdown to Might 31.